


we've been waiting for tomorrow (let's start tonight)

by weewoojins



Category: Wanna One (Band)
Genre: Background Jinhwi, College AU, High School Lovers, IOI members mentioned, Jihoon is oblivious, M/M, Mutual Pining, Wanna One Ensemble - Freeform, other idol appearances
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-11
Updated: 2018-07-11
Packaged: 2019-05-30 23:56:22
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 15,676
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15107438
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/weewoojins/pseuds/weewoojins
Summary: Jihoon’s mother used to tell him to live life with no regrets. And now, Jihoon, aged twenty, with his entire life ahead of him, finds himself with a regret that’s eating away at his insides and tearing him apart.





	we've been waiting for tomorrow (let's start tonight)

When Jihoon was younger, he remembers all the responsible adults around him telling him that regrets were not something that you wanted to live with. It was something his mother was very passionate about, and he remembers all the inspirational quotes she used to decorate their house with, all of which had something to do with living without regrets.

 

He remembers the old man who used to live down the road, and told him never to let fear hold him back from anything, because when Jihoon got to his age, he’d regret not giving it ago. He remembers the teachers telling him that he always needed to take control for his actions, and live with the regret of doing the wrong things.

 

Jihoon thinks he’s been doing pretty okay. He doesn’t have any major regrets in his life – other than the embarrassing phases he went through in highschool, but so did everyone else, so it’s okay. He doesn’t have any regrets that he dwells over now.

 

He’s sure his friends do, though. When he looks at Ong Seongwu, and Kim Jaehwan, and sometimes even Kang Daniel, and considers all the drunken escapades that he can retell about them, he thinks that they must have a million regrets in life. But Jihoon is someone who knows how to hold his liquor well, and doesn’t have nearly as many embarrassing drunk stories as any of his friends (well, except maybe Minhyun, because he’s the only responsible one out of them all).

 

Jihoon often wonders why everyone always expects childhood friends to go separate ways after high school finishes. His older brother had told him a total of thirty seven times throughout Jihoon’s senior year that he’d probably never speak to any of his friends again once he walked out the front gates of his high school for the last time ever. Jihoon has been ready for tearful goodbyes and promises to remain in touch.

 

But unlike all of his expectations, stemmed from watching _Grease_ and all three _High School Musical_ films, his best friends didn’t suddenly disappear from his life completely. All the characters were so over dramatic about going to college and losing friendships. Well, separation clearly isn’t a word in the vocabularies of Jihoon’s friends.

 

All _his_ best friends end up at the same college as him, and he can’t escape them, even if he tried (seriously, half of them have a spare key to his shared apartment, and Jihoon isn’t sure he wants to know how that came into their possession).

 

Sometimes, Jihoon wishes that they did end up in different places all over the country, like the main characters of _High School Musical_ , following their different career paths. At least then, he wouldn’t have to pretend not to know Seongwu or Jaehwan when they have a bit too much to drink at parties and get a bit too confident in their nonexistent abilities when it comes to doing just about anything under the influence.

 

Even Jisung is still a prominent figure in his life, and he’s already graduated from _college_. Yet he still likes to make unexpected visits all the time to make sure that Jihoon and Woojin are still alive, and not, you know, dead (Jihoon thinks their mothers put him up to it).

 

Woojin’s been his best friend since preschool, when the new kid moved in across the street, and Jihoon’s mother insisted on them becoming friends, even after Woojin stole his pink crayon and refused to give it back. From then on their relationship was based on petty arguments and play fighting, and everything that led to them being mistaken as arch enemies, and not best friends. He thinks Jisung only checks up on them so often to make sure one of them hasn’t killed the other by accident, or on purpose.

 

Because Woojin’s his best friend, Jihoon’s seen it all. And by that, he means Woojin’s demonstrations of what he likes to call martial arts in the living room of their shared apartment, accompanied by inhuman screaming that has raised the eyebrows of several of their neighbours, much to Jihoon’s embarrassment. He’s had front row seats to all the stupid shit Woojin has done since they met, and he’s got over half of it stored away for blackmailing purposes, or to knock him down a peg or five when it’s needed.

 

Now that he’s in college, he doesn’t really like to think of his high school days anymore, not when all it does is bring an onslaught of embarrassing memories that never fail to make him cringe. He remembers how horrible his fashion sense was back then (some of his friends say it hasn’t improved much, but Jihoon begs to differ), and somehow, he can vividly remember all the embarrassing things he did in his homeroom in the classroom at the end of the hallway on the second floor.

 

It’s an unspoken rule between him and Woojin never to bring up their cringe-worthy high school escapades. Mostly because Woojin hates it when anyone brings up his short lived emo phase, the very same ones that Jihoon finds joy in retelling at parties every so often, much to Woojin’s chagrin. For them, high school is a distant memory (two years _can_ be distant, okay), and neither is quite keen to relive that experience.

 

Daehwi and Jinyoung, however, never shut up about their high school days. Jihoon is pretty sure the entire campus knows the story of the high school sweethearts inside out by this point, because neither of them can go a day without retelling some little adventure from their high school days. Jihoon’s started keeping count, and the tally is slowly beginning to fill up the page in the back of his chemistry notebook.

 

So it’s no surprise when Daehwi’s the one to bring up high school again, when their extended friend group is lounging around Daniel’s living room, empty cans of beer sprawled across his coffee table, and empty shot glasses lined up along the edge. Most of them are reasonably good at holding their liquor, but Jihoon can hear Guanlin giggling between his one sided conversation with one of Daniel’s cats, and Jaehwan’s voice has increased in volume with every sip of alcohol he takes. Jihoon’s only tipsy, less drunk than Daehwi and Jinyoung themselves, but he’s definitely had more to drink that Woojin, who’s lying across the floor lazily, using Jihoon’s lap as a pillow.

 

Jihoon’s thankful for the small amount alcohol in his system, because even if he’s not exactly drunk, this trip down the memory lane is definitely not a conversation he want to experience sober, either. Especially not when they bring up his ridiculous catchphrase that never fails to keep him awake at ungodly hours in the morning when he thinks back to his younger self.

 

Daniel, Seongwu and Sungwoon perk up, moving closer to listen in the the recounts of the Embarrassing Shit Park Jihoon Has Done list, and Guanlin is still sprawled across the carpet giggling gleefully as Daehwi explains the time Jihoon had been dared to tell his biology teacher that he saved her in his heart (the most embarrassing thing he’s done to this day, if he’s honest).

 

Jisung disappeared into the kitchen five minutes ago, and Jihoon is willing to bet it’s to down a shot or two without the prying eyes of the ten other boys in the apartment. Jisung likes to claim that they should all be sensible drinkers, but he’s not very good at practicing what he preaches. Jihoon’s seen him down more shot glasses in one go than Seongwu, and he’s not falling for Jisung’s “responsible guardian” act.

 

He lost track of what happened to Jaehwan and Minhyun a while ago, but he thinks he vaguely remembers hearing retching sounds from down the hallway, and Minhyun’s reprimanding tone, and figures that Jaehwan’s already pushed his limit, because the boy refuses to believe he’s a lightweight, despite all the stories and hangovers as evidence to back up this claim.

 

Jihoon doesn’t let his guard down, his shoulders tensed as he tries to eliminate his embarrassing situations from the memory of all the witnesses in the room. And by all the witnesses he just means Daehwi, because Lee Daehwi is the only one brave enough and informed enough to even try using it against Jihoon.

 

Jihoon thinks Daehwi could probably get away with murder, with an innocent blink of his eyes and a casual accusation of an innocent person. He wonders just what sort of bidding he’s put Jinyoung up to, because Jihoon knows that the younger is whipped enough to hide a dead body for his boyfriend.

 

After recounting three more of Jihoon’s Deep Dark Memories, the last of which involved a drunken escapade and fight with an inanimate object, Jihoon hopes he’ll move on to the embarrassing ales of someone else. Jihoon can think of of couple off the top of his head, such as Jaehwan and his property damage while under the influence, or Seongwu and his failed pole dancing incident.

 

But Daehwi’s clearly finished with his recount on poor alcohol induced decisions, and what he brings up next instead has Jihoon narrowly avoiding spitting a mouthful of cheap beer across Jisung’s newly dry cleaned carpet. The young Satan has already moved onto his next target, fixating his eyes on Woojin, but in the seconds it takes for Jihoon to be lured into a false sense of security, Daehwi somehow manages to bring Jihoon down with him.

 

“Remember Woojin’s massive crush on Jihoon?”

 

Daehwi says it innocently, staring at Woojin, who shot up into a seated position as soon as the words left the younger’s mother, his arms digging harshly into Jihoon’s legs underneath the thin material of his track pants. He narrowly misses head butting Jihoon, something the older is grateful for, but he can’t help but notice the look that Woojin shoots the younger boy, or the way that Guanlin stops giggling, and the gossiping group from the corner stop talking for a brief moment to stare at them.

 

It’s nothing Jihoon hasn’t heard before; Daehwi spent the entirety of their high school years bringing it up whenever he could work it into the conversation (or sometimes just announcing it out of the blue). Jihoon’s never believed the statement to hold much weight, and while it was good for a laugh the first few times, Jihoon can’t work out _why_ Daehwi brings it up so frequently.

 

Woojin’s the first to react to the statement, a frown flashing across his features as he launches the nearest pillow in Daehwi’s direction (Daehwi should be lucky that Woojin’s one of the least violent people in the room — there were plenty of things within arm’s reach that could’ve done a lot more damage).

 

“Please,” says Jihoon, leaning back against the couch behind him. He waves the statement off like he does every time, with a roll of his eyes and a flick of his hand. “If he really had a crush on me, he would’ve bought me food whenever I asked for it.”

 

“If I bought you food every time you asked, my bank account would be in negative numbers,” Woojin shoots back, temporarily pausing his glaring match with Daehwi to look at Jihoon. “Your taste buds are expensive.”

 

“Do I look cheap to you?”

 

Woojin only laughs, a smile forming on his face. Jihoon scowls, and instead reaches for one of the newly poured shot glasses lined up on the coffee table and downs it in one go. Daniel makes grabby hands for one, and somehow ends up downing three before Jisung steps in, chiding the younger for reckless drinking, because Daniel is by far the most drunk out of all of them.

 

Daniel promptly stands up, only to go tumbling towards the cabinet in the corner, narrowly missing a head collision with the corner. Despite his near death experience, he seems to be giggling, and Jihoon knows that the older is going to regret it when he wakes up with a splitting headache from the amount of alcohol in his system.

 

The conversation is forgotten as Jisung moves to help him up and ushers him into the kitchen to get him some water in an attempt to sober him up, and Daehwi and Jinyoung erupt into a fit of giggles. No one brings up high school for the rest of the night.

 

Half an hour later, when Jihoon notices Woojin looking at him again, a look in his eye that the former can’t decipher, Jihoon only offers him another shot with unsteady hands. He’s too tipsy to even begin to decode what Woojin’s thinking (something that can be difficult for even the sober mind, even though Jihoon’s better than most). He watches as Woojin takes it silently, meeting Jihoon’s gaze, before tilting his head back to drink from the tiny glass.

 

That’s that.

 

  —

 

Jihoon thinks he should know better than to let Yoojung into his apartment, when it’s clear than all she’s after is the food in his pantry. Jihoon only opens the door halfway before Yoojung pushes her way into the hallway and makes herself at home in the kitchen of his and Woojin’s shared apartment. She’s already eyeing the pantry, and by the time that Jihoon makes it into the room, she’s already pulling packets out of the pantry and assembling the ingredients to make nachos.

 

Yoojung hasn’t changed at all since high school, Jihoon’s noticed, and she’s still the small yet terrifying girl who could quite easily kick the ass of someone twice her size, with an appetite too expensive for her college budget. Jihoon can relate. It’s probably why they get along so well.

 

It’s also the reason why Jihoon should lock his door on Tuesday afternoons, and pretend he’s not home, so Yoojung doesn’t invite herself inside and convince him to help her eat her way through his pantry. But Tuesday’s are the day that Woojin has afternoon classes, and Jihoon doesn’t mind Yoojung’s company (when she doesn’t eat a hole in his wallet).

 

Between the two of them, they’ve devoured a packet of Doritos, and several other containers and packets of various ingredients are staring back at Jihoon half empty from the countertop. Yoojung doesn’t seem to feel his turmoil, but Yoojung never pays for her own food, and has a talent for persuading other people to let her eat theirs. Jihoon is the recurring victim of her clutches.

 

Jihoon really regrets letting her in when she begins to rant about some boy in one of her lectures, a guy that Jihoon’s never met in his life, but should probably hate on principal, because Yoojung’s petty enough to hold it over his head if he ever disagrees with her.

 

(“He’s an asshole, I’m telling you. He keeps eyeing Doyeon up and down, and he purposely sits in front of me so I can’t see over his head during the period. Some people are just so infuriating. He should consider himself lucky I didn’t sock him right then and there,” she huffs, despite Jihoon’s obvious disinterest.)

 

Jihoon should really invest in a hobby that gets him out of the house more, so he won’t be stuck listening to Yoojung’s woes about all the people in her classes that she doesn’t like.

 

“I heard you had a little high school reunion over the weekend,” Yoojung says, once her complaints about her school work and classmates are all over. “Where was my invite?”

 

“It’s not a high school reunion, Yoojung,” Jihoon says. “It’s not like I haven’t seen them in ten years.”

 

“I missed a prime opportunity to listen to Daehwi recount all of your embarrassing moments,” Yoojung whines over the top of his statement, ignoring it completely. “I could have told them about the time —”

 

Jihoon throws a chip at Yoojung to get her to shut up. He thanks his lucky stars that Yoojung wasn’t there during his embarrassing trip down the memory lane.

 

He’s almost scared that she’s going to bring up more of Jihoon’s embarrassing tales — honestly, he just couldn’t catch a break during high school — from the way she seems to be silently reminiscing. She doesn’t speak for a moment, and Jihoon uses the opportunity to make a grab for her nachos.

 

“You were so oblivious back in high school,” is all Yoojung says, lightly slapping Jihoon’s hand away from her food, but still letting him get away with stealing it.

 

Jihoon rolls his eyes. “If this is about Haknyeon again, it really was one time. Besides, how was I supposed to know he had a crush on me when I’d only ever spoken to him once?”

 

(It’s another embarrassing story that comes up frequently, too. It involves a flustered Ju Haknyeon trying to show his affections for Jihoon by avoiding him like the plague. Jihoon isn’t a mind reader, so he’s not sure why his friends seem to think he should have magically known where Haknyeon’s affections lied.)

 

Yoojung stares at him, and Jihoon gets the feeling that she has something else to add, as if Jihoon’s got the whole thing wrong. He wonders if maybe Yoojung isn’t referring to Haknyeon after all.

 

Before she can say anything, the door to the apartment swings open, and in steps Woojin, holding far more books than he’s capable of carrying in his hands. Jihoon and Yoojung, being the great friends that they are, don’t bother to help him as he stumbles through the hallway and dumps his belongings on the couch before he enters the kitchen.

 

“You look like shit,” is all Yoojung says in greeting.

 

“Thanks,” Woojin says dryly. “Have you been eating all our food again?”

 

He gets his answer in the form of Jihoon’s and Yoojung’s sheepish smiles. Woojin only rolls his eyes, but Jihoon can see the amused look in his eye. Yoojung blinks innocently at Woojin, before she goes back to shovelling food in her mouth again. Jihoon follows suit.

 

“If you keep eating at this rate, we’ll have no more Doritos left for the rest of the week,” Woojin comments. Yoojung gasps in horror.

 

“That would be a big problem,” she says seriously. “Doritos are a staple food.”

 

Woojin snorts, and reaches over to slide the bowl of nachos away from Jihoon and Yoojung, ignoring the latter’s grabby-grabby hands as she tries to pull it back.

 

“You’re back early,” Jihoon comments, leaning against the counter. “I thought you were going out with Sohye.”

 

Woojin doesn’t reply. The only sound that fills the room is the loud crunching of the corn chips Woojin’s chewing on.

 

“You fought again, didn’t you?” Yoojung says, leaning over the counter top to stare up at the taller male. She gets a raised eyebrow in return, and Jihoon can hear the unspoken question in the air.

 

“Are you psychic or something?” asks Jihoon.

 

“Yeonjung texted me. She said she saw you guys fighting,” Yoojung says calmly, and Woojin groans.

 

“Great. The entire campus will know by tomorrow.”

 

“Welcome to college, Woojin. Gossip travels faster than airborne diseases.”

 

“I’d be more worried about Yeonjung,” Yoojung muses. “Her text message included a wordy description of her revenge plan.”

 

Woojin turned around and lightly hits his head against the overhead cupboards. Jihoon sends him a look of sympathy mixed with pity. Yoojung reclaims the nachos, finishing up the last bit.

 

“You also might want to steer clear of Sejeong, too,” Yoojung muses, around a mouthful of guacamole. “If Sohye’s upset, Sejeong will be on warpath.”

 

Jihoon winces on behalf of Woojin. He’d seen the older girl get mad, and it was the most terrifying thing he’d ever seen in all twenty years of his life. How Sejeong managed to look so calm and collected while oozing fury was a mystery to him, and it’s one he’d leave unsolved, if it meant he never had to see if first hand again.

 

“That might be difficult,” Woojin sighs. “She always comes to pick Mina up from dance practice.”

 

“Pretend to be sick until it blows over,” Jihoon tells him, with the most serious expression he can manage. “Don’t leave the apartment until you and Sohye have made up. We can barricade the doors and you can lock yourself in your room in case someone tries to barge in.”

 

“Thanks for the encouragement.”

 

Yoojung laughs, snatching the last corn chip from the bowl of nachos before Jihoon has the chance to, then picks up her keys that have been left discarded on the kitchen counter. “Have fun with him,” Yoojung says to Jihoon, spinning her keys on her fingers, and jutting her head in Woojin’s direction. “I’ve got places to be.”

 

“You mean you’ve finished off our food, and now you’re going to pester someone else,” Woojin deadpans. Yoojung smiles innocently, and while it might be very convincing, both Jihoon and Woojin have know her for far too long to be fooled (even if they’re both guilty of letting her get away with it).

 

“I’ll come and steal your food next time,” Jihoon promises.

 

Yoojung scoffs, and turns back around to face the pair of boys, leaning against the kitchen door frame. “I’m not letting you in my apartment. I can’t have you wooing my girlfriend again.”

 

“It’s not my fault I’m irresistible enough to make Doyeon fall in love with me,” Jihoon says dramatically, sounding a lot like some of the pompous characters he’s acted out for his major. “What teenager wasn’t enamored by my beauty?”

 

“Cocky isn’t a good look on you, Jihoon,” Woojin teases, a glint of amusement and exasperation in his eyes.

 

“Everything looks good on me, Woojin.”

 

“That fluro green shirt doesn’t.”

 

  —

 

If it weren’t for the date blaring back at him from the home screen of his phone, Jihoon could almost convince himself that he’s travelled back in time to his high school days. It’s like someone flipped a switch, and the entire student population is suddenly obsessed with Jihoon’s (currently non-existent) love life.

 

Jihoon knows that gossip spreads quickly around college as it did in high school. College is harder than books and movies make it out to be, and the only two things that get most of the students on campus through the day is an unhealthy amount of caffeine, and the latest gossip travelling through the departments.

 

Jihoon doesn’t bother trying to keep up with the news. With the amount of breakups and hookups that happen every other week, he decides that it’s not worth it. Besides, Daehwi and Hyungseob know the business of everyone on campus, Jihoon doesn’t feel the need to be the third musketeer in that department.

 

And even if Jihoon isn’t up to date with the relationships of everyone else, he sure as hell can keep up with his own. It’s quite easy, really, because Jihoon has a very sad love life (Woojin’s words, not his), and has the emotional awareness of teaspoon (that came from Daehwi, Jihoon’s still not sure what that was supposed to mean).

 

It starts when Yeonjung pounces on him after her choir practice one afternoon, while Jihoon is waiting in the corridor, unsuspecting, and demands to know when he intended to tell her that he was dating.

 

(“Never. Because I’m not dating anyone. And if I was, Yoojung or Doyeon would probably tell you before I had the chance to, anyway.”)

 

He’s not really sure how to take the disappointed look on her face, or the way she stares at him like he’s a total idiot, and Jihoon begins to think she’s been spending too much time with Yoojung, because he’s seen Yoojung wear the same expression a million times, and it’s _scary_ how similarly Yeonjung can pull it off.

 

Then comes his awkward encounter with Daisy Yoo, when she tries to strike up a casual conversation with Jihoon about what he and his boyfriend were planning for the weekend. Jihoon, who’d been sipping his drink at the time had unattractively spluttered most of its contents across the table.

 

(“Um … I won’t be doing anything with him. Because he, uh, doesn’t exist.”)

 

Thankfully, he’d been saved when Nancy came rushing up to Daisy with some super important news to tell her, and Jihoon was able to make a quick exit and leave the two girls alone to their gossiping session.

 

It’s the last straw when Kim Yerim comes skipping up to him when he’s eating his lunch peacefully, and immediately starts interrogating him on who he thinks are the best looking people on campus, and his top five list of people he’d be willing to date.

 

Jihoon doesn’t give her any names, and he wouldn’t even if he did know how to answer her. He knows that she’s on the school newspaper, and while she’s actually a really sweet person, she’s not very good at keeping secrets. She seems disappointed by his refusal to give her a real answer.

 

(“But what about your boyfriend? Shouldn’t he be at the top of your list?”)

 

Yeah. He probably should have realised the sudden obsession with his love life a lot sooner. But the not-so-subtle stares have been following him for three days now, and Jihoon thinks it’s beginning to get ridiculous, so, he corners Daehwi outside the music department after the band rehearsal.

 

The stares follow Jihoon even as he waits outside the band room, and they Jihoon feels annoyed at their pathetic attempts at subtlety.

 

Daehwi pays no attention to the stares when he leaves the band room and finds Jihoon waiting for him. Probably because they’re not focused on him, Jihoon thinks, Daehwi hasn’t been on the receiving end of whatever this rumour is. Jihoon just wants to know what exactly it is that’s spreading around. Everyone else on the campus seems to know.

 

He’s not even sure why this rumour, whatever it is, is a big deal. He hasn’t done anything worthy of a reaction like this recently, and as far as he’s concerned, he hasn’t grown a second head or anything.

 

“I don’t suppose you know why everyone’s been staring at me for the past couple of days?” asks Jihoon, getting straight to the point, before Daehwi can so much as open his mouth to greet him. Daehwi’s expression falters for a second, gazing to the side for a moment, trying to avoid eye contact. It’s enough for Jihoon to know something is up.

 

“I haven’t noticed,” Daehwi lies, and Jihoon raises an eyebrow, because does Daehwi really think he can lie to him? Jihoon’s known Daehwi almost as long as he’s known Woojin, and he likes to think that he’s pretty good at knowing when his friends are blatantly lying to him.

 

It doesn’t take Daehwi long to cave. “There’s a rumour going around,” Daehwi says finally, as if Jihoon hasn’t already figured that much out himself. He’s about to say this, when Daehwi continues. “Apparently you and Woojin have been secretly dating for two years.”

 

Jihoon’s not sure what to do with this new information, but now the comments from Yeonjung, Daisy and Yerim are all starting  to make a lot more sense.

 

“Did you start this rumour?” Jihoon manages to force out, because really, it wouldn’t surprise him, given the fact that Daehwi has been very fascinated in the (fictional) idea of Jihoon and Woojin becoming romantically involved. Jihoon can’t figure out for the life of him why.

 

Daehwi looks personally offended at this. “Of course not,” he says indignantly. “I just mentioned to Yoojung and Doyeon that you two would look cute together. Which you would, I’ve been telling you this since high school –”

 

“Was there anyone else there when you mentioned this?” Jihoon asks, beginning to feel a headache coming on at the prospect of figuring out how to get this rumour to die down. Somehow, he doesn’t think that it’ll just fade away after a couple of days. Not on on a college campus as large as this one, with as many students invested in gossip as this one has.

 

“Somi was there, too,” Daehwi says casually.

 

Jihoon groans. No wonder the entire school was gossiping about it. He decides right then and there that Lee Daehwi is the human incarnate of the devil, and Jinyoung is either too in love to see how evil his boyfriend is, or whipped enough to turn a blind eye.

 

  —

 

Jihoon thinks that the rumours have had more of an impact on Woojin, if the way he’s been acting recently is anything to go by. It’s been a week, and the whispers are still following him, and people just don’t seem to be scared of his death glare. Sometimes, Jihoon wishes he had a scarier face like Woojin. Maybe then people would stop staring at him so much. It’s really starting to get on his nerves.

 

While Jihoon’s been stuck with the whispers and stares, Woojin’s been on the receiving end of Sohye’s passive aggressive text messages. Not that Jihoon really blames her. If _his_ boyfriend got caught up in a rumour involving him being in a secret relationship with someone, he wouldn’t be too pleased, either.

 

On any other day, he might have mentioned this to Woojin, but Woojin looks far too out of it and disappears into his room almost immediately after making his presence known. Jihoon figures he should probably just leave Woojin to his own devices for a bit. He figures that once this whole thing blows over, everything will be fine with Woojin and Sohye again.

 

Two days later, when Jihoon meets several of his friends at some bar – Seongwu suggested it, and Jihoon’s almost certain that the older male was drunk by the time he arrived there – he’s glad he can forget about the ridiculous rumours. His mother always taught him that drinking away his problems was never a good idea, and Jihoon doesn’t intend to do that. But a few shots and some beer aren’t enough to turn him into an alcoholic like his mother fears.

 

Jaehwan and Seongwu are already drinking, and even though Jihoon hasn’t been paying attention (sometimes it’s best not to, that way there’s no way he’ll get wrapped up in whatever reckless decisions they make), he knows that they’ll wake up with splitting headaches and the bitter taste of regret the next morning.

 

Sungwoon’s taken it upon himself to try and be a mature adult, even though they all know that Jisung and Minhyun are the only ones with any hope of controlling them. Daniel’s giggling about something again, Jihoon doesn’t bother trying to figure out what, because with Daniel, it’s always something not funny anyway. Guanlin’s tucked himself away in a corner, and Jihoon can see him using the torch on his phone to read through a textbook. Jihoon applauds his effort, but he knows that it won’t last long, and Gunalin’s probably only cramming to ease his guilt about going out with his friends instead of studying at home.

 

He’d rather not get involved with the drunk antics of his older friends (honestly, sometimes Jihoon questions if they really are a couple of years older than him, because if he hadn’t seen their ID’s before, there’s noway he’d believe it), and he doesn’t want to try and talk to Guanlin while the younger boy is “studying”. Woojin’s nowhere to be seen, so he’ll have to settle for Daehwi and Jinyoung, even if they’re being disgustingly cute and cuddly.

 

He requests a drink from the bartender, before he moves over to Daehwi and Jinyoung, interrupting a disgustingly cute cuddling session as he makes himself comfortable in the seat across from them, staring at them as he brings the liquid up to his lips. It has the desired effect, as Jinyoung grumbles and reaches for his own drink, and Daehwi doesn’t bother to be discreet with his glare.

 

Jihoon is saved from the boy’s wrath when Seongwu tries to step onto a table and dramatically recite Shakespeare, while Minhyun tries desperately to get him down. Jihoon questions why he’s friends with them again for the millionth time. If his mother knew exactly what his friends were like, he’s pretty sure that she wouldn’t like them as much as she claims to.

 

“I don’t know them,” Daehwi says, turning away from the scene and trying to bury himself in Jinyoung’s side, which Jihoon thinks is both cute and disgusting. He’s starting to regret his decision to join the pair as a third wheel.

 

He’s saved from having to third wheel when Woojin comes barrelling into the bar, almost getting buried by Jaehwan when the older attempts to swing and arm around him and almost sends them tumbling from the floor.  Where Woojin came from, Jihoon has no idea, because he looks like he just ran a marathon, and his hair is all over the place. Jihoon fights the urge to reach up and fix it for him, once Woojin is close enough, and not laying flat on the ground.

 

He bypasses the bar and makes a beeline straight towards their table, and Daehwi sits up straighter in his seat. Jihoon expects a hello, or some form of normal greeting, but the first thing that comes out of Woojin’s mouth is “I did it!” as he comes skidding to a stop in front of them.

 

“Did what?” asks Jinyoung, voicing the question that Jihoon wants to know, too.

 

“You didn’t,” says Daehwi at the same time, apparently the only one of the trio in who’s in the loop, and seems to know exactly what Woojin’s talking about. Jihoon isn’t surprised. He’s half convinced that Daehwi is a mind reader.

 

“Okay, fine,” Woojin relents. “Technically, Sohye did.”

 

“Did what?” Jinyoung repeats, clearing wanting answers just as much as Jihoon himself.

 

“She _didn’t_ ,” says Daehwi, wide-eyed.

“Can someone fill me in on what we’re talking about?” Jihoon says after a moment, his eyebrows furrowed. He directs the question at both Woojin and Daehwi, because Jinyoung seems to be just as clueless as he is.

 

There’s silence for a moment, and Jihoon watches as Woojin and Daehwi exchange a look. Jinyoung stares at Daehwi. Jihoon just wants them to stop talking in riddles, they’ve never been his strong point.   

 

“Me and Sohye broke up,” Woojin says finally. “For good, this time.”

 

That was not what Jihoon was expecting. Woojin and Sohye had been a couple since their first year in college, when Woojin had finally agreed to let Mina set him up. And even though their relationship had been on again and off again for majority of their college years, Jihoon didn’t think they’d actually break up.

 

He’s not sure what the weird feeling in his stomach is. Guilt, probably, he thinks. It’s probably his fault, because they’re wrapped up in this bizarre rumour, but Woojin doesn’t look as upset as Jihoon expects, and he’s not sure what to do. Daehwi’s already jumped to his feet, leaving the comfort of his boyfriend’s arms, and is pushing Woojin down into his seat.

 

Jihoon slides his drink across the table, and watches as Woojin downs the entire glass in one go. He’s not really sure what sort of comfort to offer Woojin. Jihoon’s always been more of a pat on the shoulder and a ‘there, there’ type of person. He’s never been one to pry into Woojin’s relationship with Sohye, either, so he’s not sure what goes on between behind closed doors. Daehwi calls him a bad friend, but Jihoon always feels weird talking about Sohye, and he can never quite explain why.

 

He doesn’t know quite what to make of the silent conversation Woojin and Daehwi seem to be having – equipped with exaggerated head movements and eyebrow wiggles, which would look ridiculous to anyone who wasn’t used to their usual way of communicating, even if no one other than the two of them speak whatever language they want to call this fluently.

 

“You good?” Jihoon says finally, his question focused at Woojin.

“I, uh, yeah,” he says finally. “I think I’m taking it better than I thought I would.”

 

Jihoon doesn’t know whether or not to believe him. He wants to tell Woojin that he can talk to him, and that he’ll listen to whatever is floating around Woojin’s head. Because they’re best friends. And that’s what best friends do.

Unfortunately, before he can try and interrogate Woojin any further, Daehwi jumps to his feet and drags Woojin off to the bar, claiming that Woojin needs more alcohol as a pick me up.

 

It’s strange, Jihoon thinks, as he stares at Woojin’s retreating back. It’s almost as if he looks like a weight’s been lifted off his shoulders. Like he’s finally been set free, and he’s no longer being chained down. In all honesty, Jihoon would’ve expected a slump in his posture from the situation, but Woojin doesn’t look nearly as upset as Jihoon would have thought. He doesn’t look heartbroken, like Jihoon expects anyone who comes out of a relationship to feel.

 

Maybe he’s just overthinking it. It’s the alcohol, Jihoon thinks to himself. That’s probably it.

 

  –

 

The news of Woojin and Sohye’s breakup spreads like wildfire, like most breakups usually do on a campus their size. It’s all anyone can talk about for a week, and Jihoon almost feels glad that they’ve finally moved on from staring him down whenever he walks through the hallways.

 

Almost, because as soon as someone brings up his name again, jumping to the conclusion that the previous rumour involving Jihoon and Woojin really was true, and the staring returns again. Jihoon guesses he’ll just have to get used to it at this point, because he still has another few years before he graduates with a degree.

 

It’s bearable for Jihoon, but he hasn’t seen Woojin on campus in the past week, aside from the time he turned around the corner just in time to see him duck behind a vending machine, for whatever bizarre reason that obviously made sense to Park Woojin and Park Woojin only. While Jihoon’s the type to ignore other people, and put his acting classes to some good use, Woojin’s instincts seem to be controlled by his social awkwardness that he hasn’t grown out of in all the years that Jihoon has known him.

 

So when Jihoon finds Woojin hiding in the engineering building, flattened against the wall, he’s silently thankful that there’s no one else in the hallway to witness his best friend and his questionable antics.

 

“What are you doing?” Jihoon asks.

 

Woojin jumps, startled, and turns to look up at Jihoon, not amused when he sees the grin on the elder’s face. Woojin grumbles, and Jihoon can’t help but laugh at loud. It’s very rare that Jihoon ever has this sort of thing to hold over Woojin (because other than bees, Woojin doesn’t seem to be scared of anything).

 

“I’m hiding,” Woojin says, once Jihoon has calmed down.

 

“In the engineering building?” Jihoon raises his eyebrows. “I didn’t know you knew where it was. I’ve never seen you within a fifty metre radius of the building, let alone walking down the hallways.”

 

Woojin rolls his eyes, but finally relents. “I saw Sejeong outside with Chungha. So I panicked and ran into the nearest building,” he admits, trying to subtly look around the corner. “Sohye seems to be taking the breakup pretty well, but Sejeong isn’t. She’s after my head.”

 

If that’s the case, then Jihoon doesn’t blame him.

 

“What are you doing here, anyway?” Woojin asks after a minute, once he’s made sure that the coast is clear, and free of any individuals by the name of Kim Sejeong.

 

“Yeonjung asked me to drop off a textbook to Mina,” Jihoon tells him. “She left it at the dorm and Yeonjung had classes to go to, so she asked me to pass it on.”

 

“Mina’s here?” Woojin asks, wide eyed.

 

“Uh, yeah? She’s doubling in engineering and performing arts? We’ve only been friends with her for two years and you still don’t know her major?”

 

Woojin swears. “If she sees me, she’ll come after me, too. She spends too much time with Sejeong. She’ll hate me on behalf of Sohye, too.”

 

He glances around the next corner before he swears and tries to shrink up against the wall. Jihoon thinks that Woojin’s been watching way too many James Bond movies. He’s always said that neither of them would make good secret agents, but clearly, Woojin seems to think otherwise about his (nonexistent) spy qualities.

 

Before Jihoon can question him about his sudden change in demeanor, Kang Mina comes walking around the corner at a brisk pace. She stops when she spots Jihoon and Woojin (because he really isn’t hidden. At all.), and offers them both smiles.

 

“Hey Jihoon,” Mina says, smiling brightly. “I couldn’t thank you before, but thanks for dropping off the book. You and Yeonjung are life savers.” Then she pauses. “Woojin, what are you doing?”

 

Woojin looks like a deer caught in the headlights. Jihoon really wants to laugh, because Woojin almost looks cute. In a totally, not weird, way.

 

“I dropped my pen,” Woojin manages, the lie obvious to all of them, including Mina, from the way she glances at Jihoon with a single raised eyebrow. Jihoon just shrugs, hoping that it expresses something along the lines of _my best friend is an idiot, don’t question it_.

 

Mina seems to get the memo. “Right,” she says, drawing the word out for longer than necessary, sparing one more glance at Woojin – who still hasn’t got up from the floor, even now – then back at Jihoon. “Well, thanks again, but I really need to get going. See you around!”

 

As soon as she’s gone, Jihoon turns to look back at Woojin, who looks like he’s seriously contemplating digging a hole and burying himself in it. “You look ridiculous,” Jihoon deadpans.

 

“Doesn’t matter. No one else can see me. It’s only you, and I think by this point you’ve seen me do much worse.”

 

“That would be a valid point,” Jihoon agrees. “Except for the fact that you’re not inconspicuous at all. I’m trying to spare us both the embarrassment.”

 

He lowers a hand to help Woojin up to his feet. “Come on,” says Jihoon. “I’m hungry. Let’s go and eat off campus. Then you won’t need to worry about bumping into Sohye, Mina _or_ Sejeong.” He doesn’t wait for Woojin’s response, dragging the younger boy by the arm. Woojin should be used to this by now, anyway.

 

“Are you going to treat me?” Woojin asks, amusement in his eyes.

 

“Of course not,” Jihoon scoffs. “You’re paying.”

 

“I just got dumped by my girlfriend, and you won’t even treat me to a meal,” Woojin says, but there’s no bite to it. “Stingy much?”

 

“If you were in need of a pick me up, then maybe,” Jihoon tells him. “But since Seongwu already brought you alcohol, and Daehwi brought you chicken – none of which you shared with me, by the way, what sort of friend are you? – you have money in your wallet to pay for lunch.”

 

“You truly are something, Park Jihoon.”

 

“I’ll let you choose where we eat.”

 

“Deal.”

 

Twenty minutes later, the pair are sat in a burger joint just down the road from the main campus, which untrue to Jihoon’s word, was not picked by Woojin.

 

(“What about sushi?”

 

“We had sushi two days ago.”

 

“Noodles?”

 

“I don’t feel like noodles.”

 

“McDonalds?”

 

“Wow, Woojin, I knew you were stingy, but this is a whole new level for you. What do you take me for?”

  
“Then where _do_ you want to go?”)

 

Woojin doesn’t glance at his menu for more than a few seconds, quickly deciding what he wants, while Jihoon spends much longer, going through all of his options. If he’s getting a free meal, he needs to make sure that it’s worth it.

 

“Just pick something,” says Woojin, rolling his eyes, but there’s a look of fondness in them, something that Jihoon guesses comes from years worth of friendship. Woojin’s the only one who can put with Jihoon and his black hole of a stomach. “Anything will be fine. Just don’t pick the most expensive thing on the menu, please.”

 

It’s Jihoon’s turn to roll his eyes. He finally settles on something – within the mid price range, and not the most expensive thing on the menu, much to Woojin’s delight – and Woojin volunteers to go up to the counter and order for the both of them.  

 

Jihoon leans back in the plastic chair, which, despite matching the rest of the decour, doesn’t really earn bonus points for being comfortable, and watches as Woojin walks up to the counter to be served by a pretty girl. Even from where he’s sitting, he can see how the girl looks visibly flustered in Woojin’s presence. His snaggletooth tends to do that to people. Well, that and the satoori that he sometimes forgets to mask.

 

It’s odd, seeing the way the girl – Jiwon, Jihoon thinks her name badge reads, but he can’t really see her clearly from where he’s sitting – giggles at whatever Woojin’s said, and even if he can’t hear them, he gets the feeling that this girl, whoever she is, is trying to flirt with him.

 

Well, jokes on her. Woojin is as dense as a brick. And Jihoon means that in the nicest way possible.

 

Jihoon assumes he’s just feeling protective over Woojin, as any best friend should. Well, that and Daehwi has sent him a total of thirty texts, telling him to look after Woojin along with several threats that Jihoon has no doubt that Daehwi will actually carry out.

 

His mind wanders back to what Daehwi has been saying a lot recently, about the fact that Woojin used to be in love with him. Jihoon doesn’t know why Daehwi has suddenly felt the need to bring it up every time Jihoon is around, but he does, and Jihoon doesn’t know what to make of it. He’s not sure why Daehwi is being so persistent about it, when he should’ve dropped it long ago, before they even started college.

 

He brought it up on the daily during high school, much to the annoyance of both parties involved, even though Woojin always seemed to be far more annoyed, and Daehwi always seemed to get a kick out of it.

 

If Woojin’s crush had been real, Jihoon wonders what things would be like now. He wonders if Woojin would have treated him the same way he treated Sohye. Because even though he didn’t know all the details of their relationship, he knew that Woojin was a good boyfriend, and treated Sohye the way she deserved to be treated in a relationship, even if it had been on the verge of falling apart.

 

Then he mentally hits himself, because he doesn’t know why he’s even thinking about this in the first place. Dating Woojin would be horrifically weird.

 

People used to whisper about them being a couple back in high school, too. And it wasn’t just Daehwi who used to say it. He remembers the embarrassing situation when his homeroom teacher had called them boyfriends, which resulted in an awkward conversation about how they weren’t actually dating, and were just close friends. Jihoon thinks it’s because they went to prom together – on a dare, technically, as punishment for losing a bet with Daehwi. Jihoon has learnt from that experience never to take his chances with Lee Daehwi again.

 

Then there was the one confession from a girl that Jihoon no longer remembers the name of, which had ended in an extended apology to Woojin, about how she just wanted to get it off her chest, and had no intentions of ‘stealing his boyfriend’, something that both of them only went along with to spare themselves another awkward conversation.

 

So maybe it could seem like they were dating, if people had never seen Woojin around Sohye. Woojin and Sohye were never mistaken for anything other than a couple, with the way that Woojin always had his arm around her, and they’d sit comfortable, tangled up in each other. Jihoon was his best friend. And Sohye was the one dating him. Not Jihoon.

 

He plasters a smile on his face as Woojin returns, glancing down at their order number, a confused expression on his face. “She winked at me” Woojin says, sitting down, and Jihoon spares another glance at the girl who was serving him, who promptly looks away in a panic. Jihoon feels smug. He doesn’t know why.

 

“Aw look at you, attracting new people,” Jihoon coos, only to have a napkin thrown at his face. “She was flirting with you, Woojin. I could tell from here. How dense are you?”

 

“Not nearly as dense as you, Hoonie.”

 

“I’m not dense,” Jihoon snaps. “You’ve been listening to Daehwi too much. I’m nowhere near as dense as you are.”

 

Woojin laughs, and it’s the first real laugh that Jihoon has heard from him in a while. Then Woojin reaches across the table to ruffle Jihoon’s hair, and it turns into a full on scuffle, as Jihoon tries to keep Woojin’s offending hands out of his hair, lest he ruin it – what is he, a dog or something for Woojin to pat? – that catches the attention of the neighbouring tables. It only stops when Jiwon comes to a halt in front of their table, plates balanced on her arm, a wary look on her face.

 

Woojin straightens up immediately, a pink dusting his cheeks as he splutters out an apology for their disruptive behaviour. Jiwon, who looks equally as flustered, only set their plates down on the table, and assures them that it’s fine before scurrying off back to the kitchen.

 

The blush dusting Woojin’s cheeks almost looks cute or something. Jihoon leans toward the latter, even though he’s not sure what that something is. Then he shakes his head. He’s probably just tired. He probably just needs some sleep.

 

  –

 

Whoever said that life’s what if’s could drive you insane wasn’t lying. Jihoon’s starting to realise this firsthand. He blames Daehwi for it. It’s entirely Daehwi’s fault that Jihoon is left dwelling on what could have been, if Woojin’s crush on him was real.

 

Jihoon can’t even lock the thought away in the back of his mind. Not when all his classmates are still whispering about it (still, you’d think they’d have something better to do than discuss two month old gossip), and he sees Woojin on a daily basis (and walk around the house shirtless, but that’s completely beside the point. His stomach only feels weird about it because he’s hungry).

 

Jihoon doesn’t know why he feels so exhausted.

 

There’s a reason why he stops himself from letting thoughts like this into his mind in the first place, and he wishes that the metaphorical guards at the gate in his mind had been on duty when he went out for lunch with Woojin, because maybe he wouldn’t be antagonising over this and overthinking things to the point where it keeps him awake at night. Damn them and their inability to keep potentially disastrous thoughts from breaking through into his mind.

 

Jihoon’s mother used to tell him all the time that he had an overactive imagination. It was something she’d say every time she’d sit next to his bed for hours in the middle of the night, comforting him after he woke up shaken from nightmares.

 

Jihoon would take the nightmares over this any day.

 

Jihoon has never really thought about having a crush on Woojin. Woojin’s always been off limits, as his best friend, and up until recently, the boyfriend of Kim Sohye. So he doesn’t know why he feels like his entire world has shifted beneath his feet without anyone else around him so much as blinking an eye. It shouldn’t even be that big of a deal, he tries to reason with himself, but clearly it’s not reassuring him at all.

 

And now he can’t stop thinking about it. What if Woojin’s crush _had_ been real? Daehwi hasn’t failed to mention it every time he sees Jihoon and Woojin together, even after his breakup with Sohye, and Jihoon just doesn’t know what to think. He wishes Daehwi would just drop it, but he doesn’t think that it’s going to happen anytime soon, since Daehwi’s had years to drop it, and still continues. It’s really starting to do Jihoon’s head in.

 

Apparently all the guards in his mind that are supposed to be stopping this thoughts from plaguing him have gone on holiday, running off on vacation to whatever the equivalent of the beach is inside his brain.

 

Now that he’s beginning to overthink, he starts noticing all the small things. Like the way that Woojin always holds the door open for him and lets him go in first. Always. Without fail, even when Jihoon tries to do the same for him. He wonders if Woojin’s doing it on purpose, or if it’s just some sort of natural instinct. Maybe he does it for everyone.

 

( _He doesn’t_ , screams the devil on Jihoon’s shoulder, gleefully. _He didn’t hold the door open long enough and let Daehwi walk straight into it the other week_.)

 

Or the way that he’s always conveniently got errands to run whenever Jihoon has classes, so it’s never and inconvenience for him to drive Jihoon to class. Which is odd, because Jihoon knows for a fact that Woojin doesn’t work every single day, and he knows that Woojin never has any reason to actually go out that often.

 

(He’s only caught him out once, though, when Woojin accidentally let slip that he didn’t need to go to the post office one day, and had just driven Jihoon to class before coming home. Jihoon’s never been able to catch him out since, and Woojin sticks to his stories of the numerous errands he has to run.)

 

And then there’s the way that he always, without fail, asks Jihoon how his day has been and sits there and listens intently even as Jihoon goes on about the most boring things. Jihoon wonders if he gives the same attention to paint drying or if he’s just special.

 

( _You’re just special_ , whispers the back of his mind, sounding suspiciously like Daehwi).

 

It’s oddly domestic, how their lives have become, and Jihoon wonders if any of it would change if they were dating. Or if them dating would have changed how things turned out. Would he and Woojin still have moved in together? He hopes so, because he doesn’t think he’d be able to live with any of his other friends, and he’s not nearly independent enough to survive in an apartment on his own without eating instant food every day.

 

His mind goes back into overdrive again when he arrives home a few days later, after assuring Woojin that he’s perfectly capable of walking home after his study group. Surprisingly, Woojin gives in somewhat easily, and Jihoon blames it on the fact that Woojin had looked exhausted that morning.

 

Jihoon stops dead when he hears a sob from outside his apartment door. He freezes, worried he’s standing outside the wrong door again. He’s done it before, and it was really embarrassing trying to fit his key into the lock of the apartment a floor below his and Woojin’s, and even worse when the owner had turned up and immediately assumed Jihoon was trying to break in. He hasn’t set foot on that floor since.

 

But he knows he’s standing outside the right apartment, especially when he hears Daehwi’s dulcet tones from outside the door. Jihoon can’t really make out what the younger boy is saying, it sounds muffled through the front door, but it sounds like some form of comfort.

 

Soundproof walls and doors are probably a good thing, but Jihoon sort of wishes that they weren’t sound proof. Afterall, along with his horrible ‘spy qualities’ comes his inability to eavesdrop on conversations without making it obvious. He says that Woojin’s strong point isn’t subtlety, but Jihoon’s probably isn’t, either.

 

When he hears the calming voice of Donghyun, and Youngmin’s Busan satoori, he feels like he’s interrupting on something that he shouldn’t be listening to. Even though Donghyun and Youngmin have never been as close to the rest of Woojin’s social circle, Jihoon knows that the group of them were extremely close to him growing up. They remind Jihoon of a family sometimes.

 

The most unnerving thing is realising that it’s Woojin who’s crying, and it unsettles Jihoon far more than he’d like to admit.

 

Jihoon has known Woojin for majority of his life, and the younger had been a significant part of his life for longer than he hasn’t. And in all those years, Jihoon can count on one hand the amount of times Woojin has ever cried – all of which were due to the unfortunate passing of his grandparents and beloved dog.

 

Jihoon feels like he’s eavesdropping on something that doesn’t concern him. He knows that even though they’re best friends, there are things that Woojin doesn’t share with him, things he takes straight to his second family of Youngmin, Donghyun and Daehwi.

 

“You need to tell him …” Jihoon thinks he hears someone say – Donghyun, probably. As much as he strains his ears, he can’t make out anything else, because the conversation drops into hushed tones, almost as if they know he’s outside. He doesn’t dare try to press his ear against the door.

 

Instead, he turns around and runs to the nearest bus stop. He ends up crashing at Seongwu’s house. He sends a text with the excuse saying that it was closer. Woojin doesn’t send a message in protest, and just tells him to sleep well.

 

When Seongwu comes back to see Jihoon on the couch, he doesn’t ask questions, and Jihoon wonders if it’s because he knows. Jihoon hasn’t always been good at hiding his emotions, and sometimes, he still wears them on his sleeve without meaning to.

 

Instead, Seongwu ruffles his hair affectionately, and tells him to help himself to the food in the fridge (“but don’t touch the cake, that’s _mine_.”) and to turn the light off when he goes to sleep. Jihoon silently thanks him, glad that he didn’t try and force out answers that Jihoon doesn’t quite know how to put into words.

 

Jihoon doesn’t press Woojin about what he (thinks he) heard, even after he comes home the next day. Instead, Jihoon pretends he didn’t hear anything at all, and he thinks he’s slowly starting to get better at it. Woojin looks exhausted, and his posture is droopy, but Jihoon decides not comment on it. Instead, he tells Woojin to get some sleep, because he looks like he needs it.

 

“‘M fine,” Woojin says, rubbing his eye, a dead giveaway that he’s exhausted, even if he’s adamant on the fact that he’s not.

 

“You look like a zombie, Woojin,” Jihoon deadpans. He hopes that it doesn’t sound as uncaring as he thinks it sounds. Despite looking like the undead, Woojin cracks a small smile.

 

“Maybe I’ll get a role in a movie then,” he says. “I’d be a great lead role.”

 

“How many movies do you know where the main role is a zombie?”

 

“I’ll start the trend. I’ll become more famous than you, even without a degree in acting.”

 

“Please. You’d only be suited for zombie movies then, which narrows your roles down. At least with my face I’m not limited to anything.”

 

“Your narcissism is showing again, Hoonie.”

 

“You’re just jealous. Go to sleep, it’ll help get rid of your eyebags. Maybe then you’ll be able to apply for a normal role. You can be my sidekick in the first superhero movie I get cast in. You can do everything I tell you to do. You won’t even need to act.”

 

Woojin rolls his eyes, and Jihoon knows that he’s admitting defeat, like he always does when it comes to Jihoon. Then he turns away, and the exhaustion is back as he runs a hand through his hair. “I’ve got studying to do, anyway. Didn’t get a chance to do it yesterday.”

 

This would be the perfect chance for Jihoon to jump in and question him about it, but something tells him that he shouldn’t. Something tells him that whatever he heard yesterday wasn’t meant for his ears, and something tells him that he should let it go, and trust Youngmin and Donghyun and Daehwi to take care of his best friend for him. He goes into the kitchen to start the coffee machine, while Woojin spreads himself out across the kitchen table.

 

In the few minutes that Jihoon turns his back, the younger manages to completely cover their entire dining table in loose paper, with words detailing concepts that Jihoon would never for the life of him be able to understand. He’s glad that he chose to stick with his acting major. Jihoon leaves a warm cup of coffee in the only untouched corner of the table, and wishes Woojin good luck before disappearing back into his room to binge watch whatever comes up in his recommended on Netflix.

 

His thoughts begin to plague him as soon as his bedroom door closes behind him, and Jihoon is powerless to the way they clamber up his walls with no guards to stop them. The domestic thoughts return, and he starts overthinking again.

 

Jihoon wishes he could just obliviate all these thoughts from his mind, like he’s Harry Potter or someone equally as magical. It really would spare him all this overthinking, and he’d be able to live his life in peace, without the little Daehwi’s in his head running around and yelling at him.

 

He attempts to take his mind off it, by blasting music loudly in his headphones, then cleaning up the clothes on the floor in his room. When that doesn’t work, he tries studying, but he gets a page into his textbook and gives up, and starts spinning idly on his desk chair.

 

Maybe if he spins around fast enough, the world will start the blur, and his problems will blur with it.

 

(They don’t.)

 

Two hours later, when Jihoon finally leaves the safety of his room, he finds Woojin slumped over the dining room table, fast asleep. It’s an endearing sight, and part of Jihoon wants to tell him that he should have just gone to sleep when Jihoon told him to. But another part of him thinks that Woojin looks so cute just sleeping there, and he doesn’t want to wake him up.

 

Instead, he picks up the empty coffee cup and deposits it in the sink. Then he quietly gathers up the papers sprawled across the table and puts them in a neat pile. He doesn’t want to move Woojin, because he looks so exhausted, and Jihoon doesn’t have the heart to wake him up. He knows he can’t carry Woojin, because he seems to be made up entirely of muscle, while Jihoon’s, well … not.

 

So he stops, and just stares at Woojin. In a totally non creepy way, because Jihoon isn’t a creep. He observes Woojin’s skin, which looks soft, and the way that he still looks really good, even though he’s exhausted. Not even Jihoon could pull off those eyebags. He notices the way that Woojin seems to be sleeping like a baby, and how he looks so relaxed, a complete contrast to his stiff body language a few hours prior.

 

It’s then, when Jihoon looks at Woojin, sleeping peacefully despite the uncomfortable position, sprawled across the table in a way that’s going to give him muscle aches and pains tomorrow, he realises that he regrets it. He regrets brushing off everything that Daehwi and Jinyoung and Seongwu and everyone used to say about them.

 

He regrets not exploring that possibility that it had been real. And when he thinks about the relationship that Woojin had with Sohye, he thinks that even if it had been real, he probably doesn’t stand a chance anymore. Not when he knows that whatever relationship that could form will be nothing like his and Sohye’s.

 

Jihoon’s mother used to tell him to live life with no regrets. And now, Jihoon, aged twenty, with his entire life ahead of him, finds himself with a regret that’s eating away at his insides and tearing him apart.

 

 –

 

Apparently, Jihoon’s guards in his brain are still on holiday, because Jihoon has gone from regretting not exploring the possibility that Woojin’s crush had been real to harbouring a full blown crush on him. All in the span of a little over a month. Ridiculous. How long of a holiday do his guards need? He could really use them right now to spare his sanity.

 

He’s going completely out of his mind, and he has no one to dump it on.

 

Daehwi’s out of the question, because he’ll just start yelling about how he knew it all along. Jinyoung won’t be of any help, and Jihoon can already imagine the younger boy’s eyebrow wiggles. Jaehwan, Seongwu and Daniel can’t be trusted, Sungwoon isn’t usually very good at giving advice, and Jisung will just go straight to his mother, and Jihoon will end up on the phone to her for hours as she turns into psychologist mode and tries to get him to speak. Minhyun and Guanlin have basically cut off all ties with the rest of them on the basis of studying for the next few weeks. He briefly considers talking to Hyungseob about it, but he doesn’t want his business broadcasted to the entire school.

 

So instead, he keeps it all to himself, and tries to avoid any situation at all that might lead to him accidentally letting something slip. He’ll come up with a better plan later, but for now, this option will have to do. He’s never really been a confrontational person, anyway.

 

He starts spending more time at the library studying, because being at home with Woojin is too distracting. It’s a totally plausible reason, and it’s not like Jihoon is actively trying to ignore Woojin. He actually needs to study. He has a degree to complete, and textbooks to be read. And Woojin walking around the house without a shirt on his far too distracting.

 

He’s too busy thinking about all the valid reasons he has for ignoring Woojin to notice when a pile of books are dropped onto the table in front of him, a female figure hovering over them, as if waiting for permission to sit down. When Jihoon glances up, he almost wishes he’d stayed at home, because there, standing in front of him, is none other than Kim Sohye.

 

“Hey, Jihoon,” she greets, before taking a seat across from him. “I thought I’d come join you. How are you? We’ve haven’t caught up in a while.”

 

“Fine,” he manages to choke out. “And you?” he adds belatedly, remembering to be polite.

 

“I’m doing okay,” Sohye says calmly, opening up one of her textbooks and pulling a highlighter out of her penguin pencil case. An awkward silence follows, and Jihoon’s not really sure what to say to her.

  
“If you’re looking for Woojin, he’s not here.”

 

Jihoon wants to hit himself for saying that, because the rational part of his brain, that’s only just managed to regain control, knows that it was a stupid thing to bring up, and that he probably should have kept his mouth shut.

 

“I know,” says Sohye, seemingly unbothered. “I’m not looking for him. I’m not mad at him. Does he think that I am? I know that Sejeong is, but I’ve been trying to get her to lay off all the death glares. She’s not too pleased with him at the moment.”

 

“I think Woojin can tell. He’s been walking the long way around campus to try and avoid bumping into her.”

 

Sohye’s lips twitch in amusement. There’s another pause. Jihoon thinks that this time maybe he should just study. After all, they’re in a library, and they both have textbooks. And even though they’re not in sight of the librarian, Jihoon isn’t keen to catch her attention, because the librarian is mildly terrifying with her passive aggressive hissing at disruptive students.

 

Jihoon turns the page in his textbook and tries to read it, but none of the words stand out in his mind. If he thought Woojin was distracting, then Sohye was on a whole other level, and Jihoon is feeling a mess of things right now that he doesn’t think he can put into words, because guilt doesn’t seem strong enough to describe it. Sohye, bless her, doesn’t seem to have any clue of his inner turmoil.

 

Sohye speaks first, breaking the silence between them, her highlighter long forgotten across the table, as she now has her head resting on her palm and she’s staring straight at Jihoon. It’s almost unnerving, as if she’s seeing right through him, into the deep, dark, depths of his mind. Not that Jihoon thinks she’d be able to make any sense of it, because even he can’t string together the thoughts in his brain.

 

“Woojin didn’t tell you why, did he?” is what Sohye says. “Why we broke up,” she clarifies after a second. It’s only then that Jihoon starts to think that maybe there was more going on behind the scenes than he was aware of. Sohye takes his silence as an answer. “I’m not surprised that he hasn’t. I don’t think I expected him to, if I’m being totally honest.”

 

Now she’s talking in riddles, and it’s worse than Daehwi, because Jihoon has no idea how he’s supposed to decipher this. “I didn’t know there was a major reason,” Jihoon finally admits. “I thought you just grew apart. I figured that was why you both took it so well.”

 

Sohye gives him a small smile. “I guess that’s part of the reason. But there’s more to it than that.”

 

“I’m guessing that you’re not going to tell me, then?”

 

Sohye pauses, as if she’s mentally weighing up whether or not she should reveal the truth to Jihoon. Jihoon wishes that she would. She’s already piqued his curiosity. But she doesn’t speak for a while, and Jihoon is almost convinced that she’s not going to tell him anything.

 

“I know things, Jihoon,” she says finally. “I see what your friends have been seeing for years. I’m not stupid enough to try and cling onto a relationship when I know that it’s not going to work out. Both Woojin and me deserve to be happy.”

 

She pauses, as if collecting her thoughts, and Jihoon doesn’t dare say anything, waiting for her to finally, she whispers, “We didn’t end on bad terms, Jihoon. But there’s more to it than you know. And if you knew, then you’d understand. And I hope that for everyone’s sake, Woojin tells you the real reason.”

 

Jihoon wants to question her more, ask her what she means, but Sohye’s already pulling out her earphones and plugging them into her phone. Jihoon’s about to say something, anything, to convince her to explain what she means, but the librarian chooses that moment to come around the corner, shooting suspicious looks in Jihoon’s direction. He’s never looked away from someone so quickly. Even after she’s gone, Jihoon figures he better not test his luck, and by this point, Sohye’s already focused on studying, and he doesn’t think it’s a good idea to interrupt her.

 

Jihoon thinks about what Sohye said without pause for the next two weeks. It crosses his mind when he’s trying to go to sleep, and it’s the first thought to pop up into his mind when he wakes up. He thinks about it when he’s supposed to be listening to the professor in one of his lectures. It’s the only thing on his mind while Yoojung starts whining about there not being any food in his and Woojin’s apartment. His mind is still screaming it at him when Doyeon throws a textbook at him for not paying attention.

 

Jihoon really can’t escape this anymore.

 

He wants to believe that his feelings came out of nowhere. Like a sudden downpour that burst the floodgates and sent excess water flowing over the top. Because that’s what it feels like to Jihoon.

 

But he knows that it’s not true. He knows now that those feelings have probably been there since the beginning, when six year old Woojin walked into his class behind the teacher, snaggletooth and all, becoming best friends with Jihoon for no other reason that the fact that they were the only Parks in their class.

 

They’ve been there all along, just locked up and secured at the back of his mind, hidden behind the now unguarded wall, all for the sake of his own sanity that’s beginning to fall to pieces with his recent realisation.

 

It plagues his mind, and clearly, it’s much more noticeable than he thinks.

  
“ … Jihoon? Jihoon. _Jihoon_!”

 

Jihoon is snapped out of his thoughts by Daehwi launches a cushion at his head. It stuns Jihoon for a moment, as his attention returns to his surroundings in Daehwi and Jinyoung’s living room, the television playing some Netflix show in the background.

 

“I’m listening,” is the first thing that Jihoon says, even though he’s clearly not. He just doesn’t want to deal with a pissy Daehwi, and he knows how Daehwi feels about being ignored.

 

“No you’re not,” Daehwi deadpans. “I’ve been calling you for the past five minutes and you haven’t responded at all.”  
  
“I’m just thinking.”

 

“You didn’t even hear me when I mentioned chicken. Something’s wrong. You’re not fooling me, Jihoon.”

 

“It’s nothing,” Jihoon insists.

 

“Fine,” Daehwi huffs, before he calls back over his shoulder to Jinyoung. “Don’t bother ordering anything for Jihoon. He’s not hungry!”

 

Jihoon resists the urge to correct Daehwi and tell him that he actually does want food, but he decides he better not. It’s probably better to quit while he’s ahead, even if his stomach is grumbling.

 

He sits deep in thought as Daehwi marches off to the kitchen, muttering something to Jinyoung that Jihoon figures he probably doesn’t want to hear. Instead, he sits on the couch and tries to focus on the television in front of him, anything to take his mind off the only thought that has seemed to be crossing it lately.

 

Jihoon tries to focus on the television, even though he has no idea what’s going on because he missed the beginning of the episode, and he hasn’t seen any of the previous seasons. He only turns his attention away when the doorbell rings, and he hears Daehwi hurry to the doorway to greet the delivery guy.

 

That split second that his attention is turned away from the show on the television is enough for Woojin to come flying back across his mind. At this point, it may as well be printed in bold capital letters in his brain with flashing neon lights surrounding it.

 

He watches as Daehwi moves towards the coffee table, a large box of chicken in his hand. He thinks then that if anyone knows what’s wrong with Woojin, if anyone knows the things about Woojin that he won’t tell Jihoon, it’s Daehwi.

 

Jihoon wants to know. He wants to know so that it will stop eating him apart from the inside. He wants to know so that he won’t sit there going out of his mind for months on end.

 

But sometimes, Jihoon curses himself for his lack of a filter, which always seems to make itself known at the worst possible times.

 

“Why do you always say that Woojin had a crush on me in high school?” Jihoon blurts. Because it’s eating him alive, and he wants answers, even if he’s not sure whether Daehwi’s the best person to be asking. Daehwi’s far too smart, and Jihoon knows that it won’t be difficult for him to connect the dots and piece together the mess that’s going on in his mind.

 

Jihoon won’t need to hire a hacker to sift through the jumped keyboard smashes in his mind, not when Lee Daehwi’s fully capable of putting them into words.

 

“Because he did,” Daehwi says simply, as if it’s just as normal as commenting on the weather. Jihoon doesn’t know how he can be so nonchalant about it when he’s literally sitting two feet away going out of his mind.

 

Jihoon stares at him suspiciously, running a hand through his hair, and when Daehwi realises that Jihoon doesn’t believe it, he starts hollering for Jinyoung, which in turn, disrupts Guanlin from whatever he’s trying to do at the kitchen table, and pads over to them, deciding that this conversation is more interesting than his studying (or maybe he’s just come for the food).

 

“Daehwi, you can’t be serious.”

 

“You’re denser than we thought,” Guanlin says, making himself comfortable on the couch across from Jihoon, his long limbs hanging over the edge because it’s clearly not designed for someone of his height to lie horizontal across it.

 

Daehwi looks at him with an expression of pity plastered across his face. “Jihoon, listen to me,” he says, as if he’s talking to a five year old, even though Jihoon is the oldest person in the room. “Woojin is in love with you. He has been for as long as anyone can remember. We figured if we told you, you might actually do something about it, and we wouldn’t have to deal with the pining anymore.”

  
“Except you take obliviousness to a whole new level,” Jinyoung comments from where he’s standing in the doorway. “It flew straight over your head even after we straight up told you that he had a crush on you.”

 

“And you expected me to believe you?” Jihoon asks, immediately on the defensive. He can almost hear the amusement in their tones.

 

“Yes,” says Daehwi. “We figured you’d be smart enough to realise that Woojin is in love with you, but it’s been over five years, and you’re still as oblivious as ever.”

 

Jihoon doesn’t know what to do with this new information that’s circling his brain. “Why did no one ever tell me this?” Jihoon demands, running a hand through his hair once again. He doesn’t want to think about what it looks like now, because he probably looks like something akin to a madman for the amount of times he’s done it in the past ten minutes alone.

 

“We did,” the three of them say, in terrifying unison as if it was planned.

 

“Multiple times,” adds Guanlin.

 

“Everyday,” Jinyoung comments.

 

“For three years,” Daehwi finishes, and Jihoon knows he can’t really argue with that logic. But that’s not going to stop him.

 

“This is … why didn’t … how –?” he’s having difficulty stringing words together, after the three of them have confirmed what’s been on his mind non stop for the past few weeks. He wants to say something, he wants to pour out everything that’s flying around in his head, but the keyboard smashes are back, and anything that Jihoon tries to say comes out sounding like a garbled mess.

 

He stands up, and begins pacing around the living room, even though there isn’t much room to pace. Daehwi and Jinyoung’s apartment is much smaller than his own, and Jihoon can walk from one wall to the other in a small amount of steps.

 

“You like him, too, don’t you?” Daehwi phrases it like a question, but Jihoon thinks that everyone in the room knows it’s a statement, and that all three of them have seen through every last one of Jihoon’s defences and stripped him bare.

 

Jihoon’s silence is answer enough for him, and Jihoon thinks that this might be the closest he comes to admitting it. He barely even admits it to himself in his head, let alone be able to speak the words out loud. Because saying them outloud makes them true, but if they stay in his head, he can remain in denial.

 

“You should tell him,” Guanlin says. “I think he deserves to know.”

 

“You _need_ to tell him,” Daehwi corrects. He pauses and  glances around the room quickly, as if he’s checking for eavesdroppers, before he drops his voice to a whisper. “You didn’t hear this from me, but he’s still in love with you. And I think we all know that he’s never going to tell you that unless you make the first move. He kept it from you for _five_ years, Jihoon, there’s no doubt he’s fully capable of taking it to the grave. You have to take the chance, because one you do, he’ll meet you halfway.”

 

“But –”

 

“But nothing, hyung,” says Jinyoung. “We’ve been waiting years for you to come this realisation, because you’re denser than concrete and can’t read the signs when they’re literally presented to you. You both deserve to be happy, so do everyone a favour and _tell him_.”

 

Jihoon knows that they’re right, and he knows that he should tell Woojin. It doesn’t mean he will.

 

  –

 

Jihoon doesn’t tell Woojin.

 

He doesn’t tell Woojin when he gets home after leaving Daehwi’s apartment (after devouring the equivalent of an entire chicken, even though Daehwi told Jinyoung not to order food for him). He doesn’t tell Woojin when they go out for coffee before Jihoon’s morning classes, and Woojin refuses to let Jihoon pay for his own coffee (even when he orders the largest drink on the menu looking for his caffeine fix). He doesn’t tell Woojin when they sit down for their movie night for the first time in weeks to watch some sort of superhero movie that Jihoon barely paid attention to.

 

He’s had many perfect opportunities to say something – to ask him if it’s true, to tell him that he spoke to Daehwi, to say _anything_ – but he doesn’t. He doesn’t because Park Jihoon is scared of losing his best friends, and he’s too scared to corner Woojin in case he attacks.

 

It’s eating him alive. And given that what Daehwi said is true, then Jihoon doesn’t know how Woojin did it for this long without driving himself insane. Jihoon’s already on the brink of insanity, but the only thing insane about Woojin is his self control.

 

But it seems that now suddenly all of their friends are in on it. Seongwu and Jaehwan immediately turn in the opposite direction whenever they see Jihoon and Woojin together alone. Daehwi gives them both eyebrow wiggles that are not subtle, and equally as embarrassing for both of them. Minhyun keeps patting his shoulder, as if trying to silently encourage Jihoon. Yoojung keeps giving him knowing looks. Even Doyeon seems to know, from the ridiculous wink she tried to send him from across the table at the library, that in all honestly just looked like she had something stuck in her eye. He really hopes that Jisung doesn’t know, because if he does, he’ll have to expect a phone call from his mother in the week to whine about how Jihoon hadn’t told her about his developing crush.

 

It just makes Jihoon feel even more pressured, and he wishes his friends would stop. He knows they mean well, but they’re really not helping. At all.

 

He’s resulted to avoiding them all. But between them all, it feels like Jihoon’s hiding from almost half the campus, and it’s much more difficult that he thought. He now understands the appeal of trying to disappear through walls. There have been many instances in the past week alone when Jihoon could have really used a super power like that.

 

But he still doesn’t say anything to Woojin. He doesn’t even know _what_ to say. He wonders if this is something that needs weeks of planning, to avoid any awkward situations.

 

 _It’ll be awkward regardless_ , says the devil on his shoulder, gleefully. Jihoon doesn’t feel thankful for the help.

 

It’s a week later when he and Woojin return back to their apartment, after a study session in the library. Jihoon calls it a study session, but he knows he got absolutely nothing done, and in the entire three hours that he and Woojin spent in the library, Jihoon read the first two paragraphs of his textbook, and spent the rest of the time discreetly staring and Woojin, and glancing away every time Woojin turned to look at _him_.

 

Jihoon thinks that his grades are on a heavy decline, because he hasn’t been studying very much recently. He can pinpoint the main contributing factor to this.

 

Woojin drives both of them home, and he tries to make conversation with Jihoon in the car. Jihoon claims to be tired, as an excuse for his lack of replies. He _does_ feel exhausted, and mentally drained (and it’s not from studying). Woojin doesn’t take offence, and continues to talk softly, filling the silence of the car with the radio turned all the way down.

 

When Woojin walks into the kitchen, turning on the lights as he goes, dumping all his textbooks on the table before dropping his keys into the bowl at the end of the kitchen countertop, Jihoon finally cracks, and voices the question that’s been on his mind for the better part of five months.

 

Subtlety has never been Jihoon’s strong point.

 

“Was Daehwi telling the truth when he always said you had a crush on me?”

 

Once the words are out there, Jihoon thinks that he could have worded that better. Or not said it at all. Maybe he should’ve stuck to his rehearsed plan. He’s leaning towards the second option.

 

Jihoon’s known Woojin for long enough to see the panic flash through his best friend’s eyes for a split second, even if he masks it quickly. But Jihoon has fifteen years worth of experience in seeing right through Woojin, and while anyone else might have missed it completely, Jihoon knows that Woojin definitely did not expect that to come out of Jihoon’s mouth.  

 

Woojin takes a step back, and folds his arms across his chest. He doesn’t move from his spot behind the kitchen counter, using it to form a barrier between himself and Jihoon.

 

Woojin opens his mouth, then closes it, and opens it again. He repeats this four or five times, but Jihoon knows that his silence is answer enough, and Woojin is just trying to find a way to answer it without stumbling over his words. Because Jihoon knows Woojin, and he knows what Woojin is about to say, but he still feels like he’s trembling.

 

“You already know the answer to that,” Woojin says finally, his voice shaking and his eyes flickering down at the bench in front of them. “I know you already know. So why are you asking me a question you already know the answer to?”

 

As his best friend, Woojin knows Jihoon almost as much as he knows Woojin, and he shouldn’t be surprised that Woojin saw right through him. He realises that then that he might be able to read every single one of Woojin’s actions, but the latter can do the exact same thing for him.

 

Woojin’s right, though, and Jihoon knows that he shouldn’t be asking a question that he already knows the answer to. But there’s still a tiny part of him that doesn’t trust Daehwi, one that wants to hear the confirmation come from Woojin’s own lips. He swallows, unsure where to go now that he has the answer he wanted, because he didn’t even think he’d get this far.

 

“Why didn’t you tell me?” Jihoon asks, his voice dropping, even though there’s no one else in the apartment to listen in on their conversation. It’s just Jihoon and Woojin, and suddenly this all feels far more intimate that what Jihoon expected.

 

Woojin sighs, and runs a hand through his hair, still avoiding eye contact with him.

 

“Because that made it real,” Woojin says finally, and even though he’s not entirely sure what that means, he knows better than to interrupt when Woojin’s trying to piece his words together. “Even if I admitted it to myself, I could still talk myself out of it. But once I told you, it would have been out in the open, and I wouldn’t be able to ignore it anymore. Admitting it to you meant it was real, and that was terrifying, Jihoon.”

 

Jihoon doesn’t say anything, and he waits for Woojin to continue. “I didn’t know how you’d take it either. You never showed any interest, and I didn’t want to tell you because I knew you’d freak out –” Jihoon opens his mouth to protest, but Woojin’s faster “– Jihoon, I _know_ you, and I knew that you’d freak out. You’re freaking out now, I can see your hands shaking."

 

Jihoon’s hands _are_ shaking, but not for the reason that Woojin thinks. He thinks it’s from the adrenaline, because he can hear his heart beating loudly in his chest, and he thinks that if Woojin were standing closer, he’d probably hear it. Maybe it’s enhanced, because it’s _his_ heart, but he’s sure they can hear it pounding from down the hallway. How Woojin can’t hear it is a mystery.

 

“I didn’t want to say anything because I knew that once I did, there’d be no turning back. And I thought that was okay. It was difficult, but I managed. And it got easier and easier to not want to kiss you whenever I saw you, and it got easier to pretend that I wasn’t in love with you. But then Daehwi started bringing it up again.”

 

Woojin runs his hand through his hair again, and now it looks like a mess on top of his head from the amount of times he’s run his fingers through it. He looks stressed out, and stiff, and Jihoon wants nothing more than to pull him into his arms and hold onto him.

 

“And that’s why Sohye really broke up with me,” Woojin continues, and he sounds more emotional than Jihoon’s ever seen him, and all he wants to do is pull him into his arms and calm him down. But Woojin’s not finished, and Jihoon knows that if Woojin doesn’t get it all off his chest now, he never will.

 

“Because she knew. She saw the way I looked at you, even though I thought I was finally moving on and being happy with her. She knew I wasn’t in love with her, and she knew that she didn’t stand a chance. And I feel rotten about it. I feel rotten because I never should have gone out with her in the first place. Because I thought I would be fine, and that I was finally moving on. And then you walk in, and suddenly anything I tell myself is useless because it doesn’t matter what I do or what I say, I’m still going to want you. Even if you don’t want me.”

 

It’s still circulating around his brain, like he’s having difficulties processing it. Jihoon doesn’t know how to string coherent sentences together anymore, he doesn’t know what to say because words have too many hidden meanings and can be taken too many different ways. He likes actions, because actions speak louder than words. There’s no baffling and bullshit, it’s all do or die.

 

He remembers what Daehwi said about making the first move. Because even now, with everything out in the open, Woojin looks like he’s still holding back, like he’s not entirely sure what to make of the situation. Part of him is still scared, terrified, really, because there’s so much that can go wrong.

 

But Jihoon’s tired of waiting. He’s tired of being put through this agony the past few months, feeling like he’s about to lose his sanity because he doesn’t know what to do about his newfound feelings for his best friend. But Woojin’s been doing it for longer, he’s been waiting since they were in high school, and he still hasn’t made a move.

 

So Jihoon takes matters into his own hands. Because he’s known Woojin for _years_ , and even if he’s terrified, he knows that Woojin will always meet him halfway.

 

So in a swift movement that takes far too many steps for Jihoon’s liking, he moves around the kitchen counter that separates them and reaches for Woojin in a matter of seconds and kisses Woojin before he has the chance to stop himself.

 

Woojin leans down ever so slightly, because the height difference between them is there, even if it’s not that big of a gap, and kisses Jihoon as if it’s what he’s wanted to do his entire life. Jihoon has no complaints, and only pulls Woojin closer as he finds himself backed into the kitchen counter, letting the younger press them closer and closer together, until there’s no space left between them.

 

Jihoon doesn’t want to live a life with regrets. He doesn’t want to let fear hold him back, like the man on the corner of his old street used to tell him. He doesn’t want to let opportunities pass him by, like all his teachers warned him about. He doesn’t want to have the looming thoughts of ‘what ifs’ or ‘maybes’ to anchor him down.

 

Jihoon is twenty years old, still in college, with his entire life ahead of him. And while he still has regrets – like not talking to Woojin sooner – but that regret doesn’t eat away at him and tear him apart.

 

Jihoon is done waiting. And he knows now that there may come things in his life that he regrets (like maybe he’ll let Seongwu convince him into drinking one beer too many, or he’ll let Jaehwan talk him into doing something reckless or embarrassing on a dare).

 

But he doesn’t regret any moment spent with Park Woojin. And he doesn’t think he ever will.

**Author's Note:**

> so i've never participated in something like this before, but i think it was fun, and i'm glad that i did. it was good motivation for me to finally finish writing something, this is the longest thing i've ever written. thank you to everyone who actually made it to the end of this, because i know that i still have a lot to improve on in writing, but i hope that this was still okay (:


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